In Mississippi, Should Education Savings Accounts Subject Private Schools to State Testing Standards?

​Recently, the Club for Growth brought to our attention a salient piece by Russ Latino of Mississippi’s Magnolia Tribune Institute regarding the state’s passage of education savings account legislation.
 
In the article, Latino aptly and cogently refutes an assertion by new Superintendent of Education Lance Evans that “…if one single dollar of public money goes into a private school, then every single child in that school has to be subjected to the same assessment of every single student in public school.”
 
Latino’s tripartite response goes like this: 
 

• First, “the point of public funding of education is to educate children and prepare them for life, not fund any one system.”

 

• Second, “funds do not flow directly from the state to private schools, but rather, from the state to families — who are then free to make their own decisions about how best to educate their students.”

 

• And third, “education savings account programs in other states all have accountability measures built in, usually in the form of what is called a national norm reference test, which allows for a child’s progress to be compared to peers.” Requiring all private school students to participate in state testing, Latino argues, not only constitutes gross overreach but defeats the point of school choice in the first place.

 
Latino goes on to repudiate the argument that Mississippi’s school choice program is somehow unconstitutional. Like many states, Mississippi’s constitution prohibits the direct appropriation of public monies to private schools. And, also as in many other states, the issue of giving public funds to individual students has already been adjudicated – in Mississippi, some 80 years ago.
 
Latino writes, “In that case, the Court ruled that since [textbook aid] went to ‘individual pupils’ the private schools were not the direct beneficiaries of the program and it was constitutional. The decision and its logic have remained untouched.”
 
Kudos to Mr. Latino for combating the illogical arguments of school choice opponents with some unassailable logic of his own. His thoughts are well worth the read.